Electronic Structure and Magnetism of CuNi Coherent Modulated Structures

The electronic and magnetic properties of a coherent modulated structure consisting of three atomic layers each of Cu and Ni perpendicular to [111] were determined from ab initio self-consistent spin-polarized energy-band calculations. We predict a substantial reduction in spin magnetization and contact hyperfine fields H_n at the Ni layers (in contrast with enhancements reported earlier from ferromagnetic resonance measurements), charge (0.1e^-) and spin (~0.01μ_B) transfer to the Cu sites, and large H_n at the Cu nuclei.